Self-Discovery is the Name of the Game for this Matchmaking Agency

There are so many ways you could meet your person. But when you’re looking for the real deal, you need to look in the right places. 

Last year, I met a friend of a close friend. We all talked about how strange it was that we were meeting for the first time, and it seemed serendipitous that our meeting had been held off until that moment. 

When we met, we instantly hit it off– we had the kind of chemistry other people noticed.

We had so much in common and got along great. We started hanging out more, and by the time romantic feelings had developed, something became clear. 

He wasn’t ready for a committed relationship, and, despite how well we got along and how much we enjoyed our shared time together, he couldn’t be present in the relationship the same way I was, or wanted to be. 

I met this guy through the means we tend to romanticize– he just kind of stumbled into my life. But that stumble proved to be a sign of things to come. I put a little more time, and definitely too much heartache, into a person who wasn’t looking for the same thing.

When you’re serious about dating, don’t give time to people who aren’t. A matchmaker can help you make sure you’re protecting your time and energy by putting you on dates where there’s no confusion about what people want: Everyone in the matchmaker’s database is looking for commitment.

We talked to Stephen Frost, the head of Japanese matchmaking service Marriage Matching, about serious dating, the growth of matchmaking, and Japan’s dating culture

Marriage Matching helps marriage-minded singles in Japan and across the world find partners who are in the same stage of life and ready to find a committed and compatible partner.

Japan’s dating culture looks quite different from the culture a Western dater would be accustomed to, and Stephen said Marriage Matching’s approach has been carefully designed to meet the needs of modern Japanese daters.

“I’ve lived here for the last 14 years,” Stephen told us. “People are exceptionally kind and caring, and there’s a high degree of honesty. On the flip side, when it comes to meeting a partner or a friend, it is exceptionally rare to actually start a conversation with someone and bring it deeper than surface level.”

Finding Inspiration in Japanese Dating Culture

Matchmaking’s end goal is a committed partnership, if not marriage. As we all know, marriage is a distinctly cultural agreement, so it’s going to look different depending on where you live. 

Stephen told us Marriage Matching was designed to meet the needs of Japanese daters, which are distinct from their American or British counterparts.

“I’ve lived in various countries overseas,” Stephen told us. “Most of my life was in Australia or the U.K. In Western countries, it’s way easier to get chatting with someone, swap contact details, and plan a date.”

Stephen said it’s not so simple in Japan. He told us his experiences in Japan have highlighted the country’s kindness, willingness to help, and emphasis on trust. “I mean, if you’re in an area you’re not familiar with, people will go out of their way to take you to where you need to be,” he said. 

But when it comes to dating, singles in Japan don’t feel as comfortable about making a move. 

“What I’ve seen with clients is that unless they’ve got mutual friends, mutual coworkers, or know some of the same people, they won’t exchange contact information– full stop,” Stephen said. 

Stephen said the difficulties can be exacerbated for foreigners living in Japan who are looking to date. People may assume they’re just in Japan on vacation, or feel some level of wariness about their motivations. 

“In Japan, if people don’t meet in junior high or university, they get into a career and get locked into the single life,” Stephen said. “Marriage agencies are growing in popularity, and it’s symptomatic of how hard it is to meet people.”

Marriage Matching Focuses on What Matters

Stephen gave us some stats on the growth of marriage agencies in Japan. “If you go back 10 years ago, around 5% of marriages came from marriage agencies,” Stephen said. “By the end of 2022, that number had gone up to over 15% of marriages.”

Now that more singles are looking to matchmaking agencies, the agencies are adapting their methods and processes to meet their needs. Stephen told us most of their clients come by way of their website. Once they’ve filled out the web form, a member of the team gets in touch for a consultation.

If you live in Osaka, Marriage Matching will meet with you in person to discuss what you’re looking for. The agency offers virtual meetings for singles who live outside of Osaka. 

Stephen said face-to-face meetings are the best because they give your matchmaker the chance to experience your personality and get to know you.

“Initially, it’s about getting to know people, understand their character, their personality, their thought processes, and, very importantly,” Stephen said, “what they’re looking for in terms of a partner.”

Marriage Matching takes the time to learn about your dreams, for yourself and your relationship. Your matchmaker needs to know more about you than where you grew up, what you do for a living, and whether or not you want children.

Your matchmaker needs to know your deep desires, especially the ones relating to partnership. “Those kinds of things have a major impact on the kind of level of success that people can actually achieve,” Stephen said.

If you seem like a good fit for Marriage Matching, the team will run you through a background check. This check ensures that everyone in the database is safe and trustworthy. “We are very careful when it comes to background checks because we don’t want surprises down the line,” Stephen explained.

Once your matchmaker knows your history, your goals, and your dreams, the introductions begin. Marriage matching also offers a self-search, where you can browse other profiles in a portal and reach out directly from there.

If you’re interested in another profile, your matchmaking team will do behind-the-scenes work to make it happen. Marriage Matching’s self-matching system is like online dating, but with less risk, higher levels of safety, and a highly serious dating pool.

How to Know You’re Ready for Matchmaking

If you go into dating thinking it’s not going to be a pleasant experience, the odds are in favor of a bad time. Mindset really is everything, and Stephen said this is especially the case in matchmaking.

“Finding the right partner, finding true love, finding a soulmate– it’s realistically about mindset,” Stephen told us. “When people are clear from the past, when they’ve let go of things that are limiting them, it becomes way easier for them to find the right person.”

These limiting beliefs stop us from attaining what we really want. Let’s say you want a committed and healthy marriage. If your past is full of negative or toxic relationships and unsuccessful dating experiences, you have to process and let go of these things to find something better.

This ties back to the law of attraction, which suggests that we attract the things we think of the most. If you’re stuck on bad experiences, the law of attraction posits that your mindset will put you back into these uncomfortable situations.

“It’s a case of cleaning things out so the law of attraction can do its thing,” Stephen said. It’s about expecting the best, focusing on the greatest parts of your future, and putting these positive forces into action in your daily life.

Every process Marriage Matching completes is in an effort to make dating easier. The process allows you to work through your past and step into the brightness of your future.

Stephen said the power of the self-discovery that comes with matchmaking is evident to him every day.

“A lot of the world itself tends to just bring people together very easily,” Stephen said. “Almost magnetically. We go through all of these things to get an understanding of where people are coming from, what’s actually going on, and the kind of partner they would flourish with.”